


Your fall was not an accident (you were chosen for the damned)

by Nug



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, But HAHA HE’S IN PRISON, Clay | Dream-centric (Video Blogging RPF), Gen, Hurt Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF), Hurt No Comfort, I make Dream a bit sympathetic here, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, One Shot, Sad Ending, boxed like a fish lmaooo, if you’re here for nice comfort fic of Dream in prison this is not it, kind of an open ending ig
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:27:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29767224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nug/pseuds/Nug
Summary: What is death to a dead man walking?To a man of fallen schemes and broken masks, it’s never permanent. Not to him. Prison is a dreary place.( Alternatively: A non-linear account of Dream’s time at prison, using his writing in his book and the people around him. )
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 104





	Your fall was not an accident (you were chosen for the damned)

**Author's Note:**

> Just a heads-up the logs are not in order! It’s all jumbled up, idk if that might be confusing. This is my first time writing in this kind of format.
> 
> Hope you enjoy :)

~~Journal~~  
~~Book of-~~

Dream’s Logs—

LOG VII: 

~~what do i write?~~

The clock is annoying. 

It keeps ticking and ticking, and it’s so goddamn loud. I should destroy it. Maybe throw it in the lava. But I’ll get a new one anyways. Probably. 

~~Sam~~ The warden will drop off a new one. 

~~Let’s keep the clock to keep track of time.~~

Should I sleep? The obsidian is uncomfortable. The lava is hot. Bright. ~~I want to stick my hand in it.~~

No one’s visited. The warden comes to drop off potatoes, but it looks like soon he won’t need to. New machinery and all.

I shouldn’t be in here. That fucking- eveything wahs goneg FINE AND-

END OF LOG __

( _There’s blood splattered near the end of the page, dry and brown. Messy scratched out words are scribbled there as well, indiscernible and unreadable. They can only make out one word:_

 _Gone._ )

LOG II: 

I’m going to get out of here. They’re wrong if they think this is going to keep me here forever. They’re Wrong. 

The obsidian is hot now. I haven’t slept. I don’t need it. 

I need to think. I can get out of here. i can. i will. 

They took my things. Like I did with Tommy. But I still have my mask. They won’t take that away, they couldn’t. They wouldn’t. I’d stop them.

The obsidian is hot. I can deal with it.

END OF LOG II

“What are you doing?”

Tubbo stares curiously at the blond in front of him, the said boy suddenly stopping in his gait. 

Tommy keeps his eyes in what looked to be no specific direction. His gaze was fixed, brows furrowed and mouth downturned; and Tubbo almost would say he looked—

Tommy is contemplative. He is thinking. Tubbo’s question registers faintly in the back of his head, but it’s background noise compared to the buzzing in his ears, the loud voice that is Trauma booming in his head. 

“He’s not coming out, right?” Tommy says, instead of an answer. Tubbo knows instantly who he’s talking about, and realizes where he was staring at.

A small, reassuring smile graces Tubbo’s lips. 

“Of course,” he replies naturally. There’s a confidence behind his words he’s not sure is completely real. But he needs it to be, because he doesn’t know what he’d do without it. “That man is gone.” 

At that, something changes in Tommy’s eyes, and Tubbo’s fingertips feel numb when he doesn’t realize _what_ changes. 

“Yeah,” Tommy mutters under his breath, “yeah, there’s nothing to worry about.”

He turns away, breaking his gaze from the direction of Pandora’s Vault. No use looking at the past.

The green bastard deserved this.

There is no sympathy for the damned.

LOG VIII:

The walls are filling up.

The clock is still there. Ticking. I’m used to it now. It’s not really quiet. So I scratched some tally marks on the obsidian to count the days.

Today marks Day 84. 

How long will it take to fill up the walls? I think maybe two years if I cram it. Maybe that’s pushing it.

I’m going to get out before that.

Obsidian is tough. My hands have some burns. I didn’t put my hands in lava. The obsidian is getting hotter. So I sit near the water.

Can’t ~~wirte~~ write too good. Just barely. 

I can get out. I just need to wait.

END OF LOG VIII

Perhaps it’s the leering black walls, the oppressive heat of lava behind it, or the emptiness of the halls, that has Sam feeling oddly— oddly heavy. He’s been in this place for too long, he supposes, but it comes with the job.

He’s the warden. He will act as such.

He doesn’t know exactly how to feel about the prison. It is the monument of his months of hard work, his proficiency with redstone, and the very place which imprisons the resident monster of the server. Should he be proud?

The original purpose, the original intent of this place though—he doesn’t want to think about it.

When did he stop seeing that man as a friend, and start seeing him as a villain? He doesn’t remember; it feels sometimes he’s always felt like that towards the other man, and that scares him. It scares him because that has him asking himself if the man was ever good. 

He was. The words rest at the bottom of his gut, and he ignores it. He shakes his head, practiced apathy settling over him like a well-worn mask.

He’s the warden. He will act as such.

There is no mercy for the prisoner.

LOG __:

Lava is fascinating. I put my hands in it.

It hurrts. Blisters. Red. I have water. Cold. 

How would it feel to swim in it? I think ~~relie~~ relieving. I’ll try someday. I’m starting to lose track of days. There’s just lines on the walls. 

I’m tired of potatoes. Can’t eat.

My mask is cracking. 

Can I get out? 

END OF LOG __

( _Desperate words follow, scrawled under but unable to be read. Ink is smudged everywhere. and the pages are burnt at the edges._

_The paper almost feels like it’d crumble. More blood splotches are found, mixed with the black of ink. Crimson and ebony make an ominous mix._

_A small smiley face is drawn on a corner._

_“Please” is written below it._ )

LOG __X:

bad day.

i ~~can’t~~ couldn’t breathe, nightmares, nightmares i hate them i don’t need sleep.

But i want to sleep. I’m tired. Everything is out of control.

Can I get out? 

~~No.~~

i’m sorry. Am I? I did bad things. I’m the villain. I think I liked it before. Do I now?

~~imsorryimsorryimreallu sorry pleade im sor y let meout?/ the sunletme se eit~~

~~Ill be goo d~~

Can I get out?

END OF LOG __X

“Don’t tell me you’re going to _visit_ him?”

An indignant voice echoes against the walls. Sapnap’s frown is prominent, his lips turned into a scowl as he crosses his arms together in frustration. “George, he’s gone. That’s not the Dream from before. That’s not our Dream.” 

“I know,” George grits out, the words choking him. “You don’t think I know this? I just—” He grimaces, rubbing two fingers against his temple. His goggles rest on top of his head, gleaming. “I want to take a last look. Please.”

Sapnap hesitates, scowl melting into a softer frown. He thinks it over, fists clenching and unclenching a few times before a harsh sigh leaves him.

“Okay,” he breathes out, “Okay fine. I’ll come with you.”

“That’s fine,” George says, quietly. “One last look.”

The word “ _last_ ” hangs between them like a blade, ready to fall and cut deep into wounds yet to fully heal.

“He’s dangerous,” Sapnap murmurs, cautioning him even when he had the same feelings as George about this matter. “Don’t get close to him.” George only nods. His goggles now cover his eyes, black tinted glass shielding the hundred of emotions that flash behind it.

There is no kindness from the betrayed.

LOG __:

I’m being weak. 

I’m in the right here. right?

This was all done for the server to make them stronger! Why am I here? I’m not supposed to

I’m not supposed to be here. 

~~hate themhate themha te them TRAITORS~~

My skin is red. Bloody. I’ve been scratching it too much. Pain is controlled, nothing else is. It feels nice.

It hurts too.

I swam in lava. Then I fell into water. Lava is better, arguably. It’s warm, very warm. There’s some burns that haven’t healed when I ~~respwaned~~ respawned. 

The tally marks almost make up the whole wall. I don’t know which I prefer. Tally marks, or not.

I can swim in lava for about ten seconds before coming back into the water. Maybe I should try to see if I can make it longer.

What if I tried that in the water?

Why am I here? I’m in the right, aren’t I? What went wrong?

END OF LOG __

( _There is no blood, surprisingly enough, on this page. But the paper is scuffed, crinkled and fragile. The ink is steady, not as messy as the previous page._

_But on the next page, there’s small writing written near the corners as if it didn’t want to be seen._

_“I’m only alive because I can bring back what was dead. What’s going to happen when all who were dead are alive?_

_I’ll die. No one to bring me back then.”_ )

The lava splits apart like a molten curtain, and Dream, for the first time in a long while sees what it’s like outside his cell, even if it’s just the rest of the prison and the pool of lava surrounding him. 

His mask, split in two, lay pathetically by his side, as he sat curled up with his knees against his chest in the deep corner of the cell. Red tinted the once white of it.

Who are his visitors?

There are three sets of feet in front of him, he notices from under his shaggy hair. One of them is the Warden. The other two—

He gulps, his throat painfully dry, at the realization. This couldn’t be real. Not possibly. 

“Dream,” Sapnap says, voice cracked. “Why are you— what did you—”

Dream finds himself standing up abruptly, ignoring the dizzying waves of nausea that wash over him. Bile sears the back of his throat, and he heaves to the side. Nothing comes out—there’s nothing there to throw up. He’s foregone any potatoes that came through the automatic dispenser, and he hasn’t touched them in so long.

He distantly hears someone say _Sam, why is he like this? He’s all burned—_

_I haven’t checked up on him in months—_

_He looks like he hasn’t eaten—_

_This is what he deserves._

If he didn’t, then why was he here? For nothing? The thought makes his skin boil unbearably, fire scalding underneath his flesh.

He _can’t_ be here for no reason. 

He couldn’t have suffered for nothing.

Dream opens his mouth to speak, but weeks and months of no one to speak to allows only croaks and coughs to escape him. He forces the words he wants to say through his throat, all of it feeling like knives scraping his neck bloody. 

“Y—you— what are- are you do—doing here?” 

“Your mask,” George rasps, eyes darting from the shattered porcelain stained with blood on the ground to the scarred man in front of him. “Dream, you—”

Dream’s scabbed hands fly up to his face as he stumbles backward, bending down to slouch against the wall as he tries to regain any normal sense of mind.

Pandora’s Vault is not so kind a place for that.

“Nonono,” Dream whispers, faint and weak, “nononono, please, let me— me wake up, please, this is just so-some dream, some nightmare— when did I fall asleep I made sure I wouldn’t—!”

Someone grabs a hold of his wrists, and the contact, _human contact_ , has him reeling. Shuddering gasps leave his lips, eyes wide yet unseeing as he tries to focus on the man in front of him.

“Calm down,” the man says, steely and leveled. Dream, if he was in any better state of mind, would’ve heard the ever-so-slight concern that lay underneath his tone before it’s pushed down. “Hey, look at me. Look at me.” And Dream does, he tries, and he sees green. He calms.

He likes green.

“You haven’t been eating,” the other man notes, inspecting the scrawny limbs and jagged fresh scars that painted its skin. He frowns, unnoticed from behind his gas mask. “Why.”

Dream doesn’t answer, eyes wandering behind the man. Goggles and white bandana. He knows them. He wants to cry and scream. 

“How long,” he asks the green man in the gas mask. He wants to know the time. “How long?”

There’s a silence, tense and uncertain, before he answers. 

“Almost eight months,” he says slowly, letting go of Dream’s wrists. He seems to finally notice the mess of tally marks that littered the obsidian walls, and so do George and Sapnap. Blood drips from it, fresh, and older, dried blood sticking to the ridges. It’s horrifying to look at, and the full stench of blood hits them all at once. 

“What did you do?” Sam asks, hands hanging by his side. He reminds himself: he is the warden, and this is his prisoner.

Dream answers this time. 

“I went swimming,” he says raspily, staring at the lava outside with a look almost like wanting. “And porcelain is sharp when broken.” 

He looks at their faces, once, twice, then lets it fall on his knees.

For once, Dream wants to sleep.

LOG Xx?:

Sam george and sapnap came today.

I’m tired. 

I don’t need them. ~~I want them.~~

Do I deserve to rot here? I’m powerful. I could get out.

It’s been too long. I can’t.

But Tommy needed that push. He needed to learn. There were rules put for a reason. Why don’t they listen?

Tyrant. Hunter. Monster. Villain. 

Can someone call me a hero? 

No what am i saying  
im being ~~deli~~ delusional. Eight months. EIGHT

Maybe I’m wrong.

END OF LOG Xx?

Technoblade is a man who doesn’t waste time regretting things he’s done.

He doesn’t look back on the _what-if’s_ or the _what-could’ve-been’s_. There’s no point in useless things like that. Whatever he’s done, whether it was to raise his blade to kill or to cut ties off, all of that is deserved.

He comes to visit a fallen man in his prison.

As the lava parts, the first thing he sees is blood. It’s everywhere, on the walls, on the ground, and on the man himself. And although he worships the pagan of crimson, of blood and battles and death, the sight disgusts him.

What had Dream become now?

The said man doesn’t even lift his head up from his spot in the corner, opting to burying it deeper between his legs as if trying to hide. Technoblade doesn’t recognize the broken man in front of him, none of his former confidence or strength present at all. 

Pandora’s Vault is a lonely place. He almost feels pity for the man before he stops himself.

This is the place Dream had ordered built himself, and the intended prisoner was his brother. 

Any kind of sympathy towards the man withers down, and a cold apathy replaces it. He came here for a look at the man who gave everyone hell, the man who had once been an ally. A friend.

Well, he thinks, it was never meant to be.

“Dream,” he drawls, carefully monotone as he steps further into the cell, “you seem worse for wear. No longer homeless too.” 

Even at that, Dream doesn’t respond, only labored breathing heard from his corner. Technoblade frowns. He walks closer to the hunched man, and notices the blood-stained pieces of porcelain scattered around him. Dream’s mask.

“Dream?” he calls out again, his frown becoming deeper as the seconds ticked by. The clock on the wall suddenly seemed a lot more louder.

And then, after three long ticks, Dream raises his head.

A long cut stretched from his left cheek to over the bridge of his nose, still red and fresh, and burns peeked from under his bright orange prison jumpsuit, ugly and jagged. His eyes were dull, no longer emerald green as they had once been, now replaced with a muted grey. 

He looked like a dead man walking.

“What happened to you?” Technoblade asks. The question asks all the things everyone wants to say: what changed? Why?

Dream bows his head, a strange chuckle leaving his lips. “Things went wrong,” he says humorlessly, his shoulders shaking. “It wasn’t supposed to go this way.”

“Really? Was Tommy supposed to be here?” His words are sharp, unforgiving, and Dream takes in the carefully controlled expression of Technoblade. “Tubbo? Me?”

He stays silent, Would Techno listen if he called in his favor? Probably not. It’s been a few months since he came here, he thinks, and this is the first time the half-piglin came to visit. 

Technoblade’s gaze hardens. “You’re not coming out of here anytime soon. Why’d you do it?” 

“Techno,” Dream says, throaty and dry, “I’m going to call in my favor.”

“Excuse me? Why would I—”

“Leave.”

The clock loudly ticks in the background, thrumming against their ears.

Tick. 

“Please leave.”

Tick.

“You’re running, Dream. You’re not going to make it far.”

Tick. 

Tick.

The lava splits again, and the ringing of the clock is the only thing that keeps a man with a mask of sin company. 

LOG X/vxX?:

Wilbur’s alive. 

No ghosbur. Alivebur, it’s Wilbur now. I revived him.

It messed me up. Bringing someone back to life isn’t easy, because you’re messing with a law that shouldn’t be broken. I couldn’t get up for days after that.

No one looked at me.

Are they going to kill me? No use for me now, it’d be better for them if I’m dead. Or maybe they’ll be making me bring back Schlatt. 

~~So theyre forgiven and not me.~~

Tommy looked better when he came to make me bring back Wilbur. Stronger. So did everyone else, I guess. I think they’re happy.

Can I be? 

Am I sorry? I’m not sure. Do I regret?

END OF LOG X/vxX?

( _There’s something wet that splashes onto the paper after that. Was he writing this next to the water?_ )

Dream stares, entranced by the molten colors of red and orange that dance in front of him. It’s warm. He lifts his hand up to just barely brush it, blisters and red searing burns erupting onto his skin. It pricks, _it hurts so much_ , but he’s so used to it he doesn’t so much as flinch.

Then he laughs, crazed and maniacal. 

He leans forward, and falls into lava. If he closes his eyes, he can almost fool himself into thinking the warmth of the liquid fire around him was human.

_Dream drowned in lava._

_Dream drowned in lava._

_Dream drowned in lava._

_Dream drowned in lava._

_Dream drowned in lava._

_Dream drowned in lava._  
_Dream drowned in lava._  
_Dream drowned in lava._

There is a bitter triumph in crashing when you should be soaring.

**Author's Note:**

> Also I KNOW I SHOULD BE WRITING FOR MY OTHER FIC BUT LET ME BE 😭😭
> 
> If you read my other fic “I’ll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife” I’ll get another chapter out soon 🙏


End file.
